Through Junko Miyawaki’s preface, this essay explores the opacity of modern China, the difficulty of writing a true history of the People’s Republic, the falsity of Chinese statistics and sources, and the resolve the Japanese people must have when great upheaval eventually strikes China.
It is a highly suggestive piece that urges Japan as a whole to face China’s present reality and consider how to prepare for the crisis to come.

2019-06-16
When I think about China’s future, I do not believe it can continue safely as it is.
When great upheaval strikes China, I want all Japanese people to think in advance about what sort of resolve they should have in dealing with it.

This is a chapter I posted on 2018-12-10 under the title, “But modern China is such a troublesome and incomprehensible existence that I had no intention of touching it.”
I think it was Masayuki Takayama who taught me of the existence of Junko Miyawaki.
The alumni of Ise High School, Kyoto University, and the Graduate School of Osaka University should take great pride in the fact that Junko Miyawaki, who specialized in Mongolian studies there, possesses learning that is among the finest in the world.
The following is the preface to a book that I learned of recently through a lower advertisement in a newspaper and immediately began reading.
The emphasis within the text is mine.
Introduction.
My book The True History of China [1840–1949], published by Business-sha in November 2011, supervised by Okada Hidehiro and issued by myself, was received so favorably that even I, the author, was surprised, and by October 2014 it had already gone through nine printings.
Moreover, in November 2015 and then again in January 2016, Chinese-character editions translated into traditional Chinese were published in Taiwan together with my The True History of Manchuria [1894–1956], also supervised by Okada Hidehiro and published by Business-sha in 2013.
In The True History of China, I wrote very frankly about how mistaken what had hitherto been accepted as conventional wisdom actually was, and what drew particular attention was that I exposed how Sun Yat-sen was in fact a grandiloquent and outrageous liar, and how he betrayed Japan and the Japanese.
That is why I was astonished when Taiwanese people said they wanted to translate this book.
It is truly heartening that even people in Taiwan, who revere Sun Yat-sen as the father of the nation, have come to want to know the true history of China.
Once a traditional Chinese edition appears in Taiwan, intellectuals in Hong Kong and on the mainland will surely read it as well.
I believe that not only the government, but all Chinese people themselves are aware of just how full of lies what Chinese people write really is.
The reason that the above-mentioned book ends with the birth of the People’s Republic of China in 1949 is that I am not a specialist in modern Chinese history, and I thought it far beyond my proper role to write the true history of the Chinese Communist Party.
My specialty is Mongolian history, and in particular I earned my doctorate in the history of the Dzungars, the last Mongol nomadic empire, which swept across Central Asia in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and threatened the Qing dynasty and Russia.
Even so, as I looked into anything related to Mongolia, my interests expanded into the history of Manchuria and Korea, and I also came to involve myself in modern Japanese history, which from the end of the nineteenth century was deeply connected with Korea and Manchuria.
Since I originally come from the Department of Oriental History, I suppose I know more about the general history of China than the average person.
But modern China is such a troublesome and incomprehensible existence that I had no intention of touching it.
Since I firmly declined to write a sequel, Business-sha asked Professor Kō Bun’yū, an old friend of my husband Okada Hidehiro, to write one instead, and The True History of China [1949–2013] was published in 2013, which relieved me greatly, and I felt grateful to Professor Kō.
However, Business-sha continued without giving up to ask me to write a sequel, because it was said that readers of my earlier books also hoped for one from me.
In my desperation, I casually said that if Professor Masahiro Miyazaki would teach me various things, perhaps even I might be able to write a modern history of China, and that became the beginning of this book project.
Mr. Takashi Karatsu, the president of Business-sha, is on close terms with Professor Miyazaki, and a planning meeting was immediately arranged, and before I knew it the discussion had advanced to the idea that, leaving The True History of Modern China for the future, we would first publish a dialogue book on China.
Professor Miyazaki updates every day his free e-mail newsletter, “Masahiro Miyazaki’s International News, Early Reading,” and by October 2018 it had reached more than issue 5870 in total, and because I read this every day and thereby learn the current state of China that the major media do not report, using it as a basis for my own judgment, I could hardly imagine that I would be able to contribute anything to him.
Professor Miyazaki is the very model of a journalist, someone who does not simply trust what others have written but instead personally visits every relevant place and makes his own judgment, so I thought that there was nothing about the present situation that he did not already know, and nothing at all that he needed to ask me, and so I found myself wondering what in the world to do.
But as you will understand if you read this book, Professor Miyazaki and I had known each other from quite some time ago through “Michi no Kai,” presided over by Professor Kanji Nishio, and because he is a kind gentleman to everyone, he asked questions that were easy for me to answer, and the conversation became lively and turned into a very enjoyable dialogue.
I read not only Professor Miyazaki’s newsletter but also most of his recent books.
I also purchased on the internet and read again The Tragedy of China from thirty years ago and The Great Division of China from twenty years ago in preparation for this dialogue.
I also reread Chinese People as Understood by Their Birthplaces (2006, PHP Shinsho).
His views concerning Chinese culture and various other conditions completely coincide with mine.
Readers may perhaps regret that there was no part in which differences of opinion led to a fierce debate, but are not our views of China still very much a minority within Japanese society in general?
But when I think about China’s future, I do not believe it can continue safely as it is.
When great upheaval strikes China, I want all Japanese people to think in advance about what sort of resolve they should have in dealing with it.
The conclusion I arrived at after being taught about modern China by Professor Miyazaki is that it will for the time being be impossible to write a “True History of the People’s Republic of China.”
That is because the statistics put out by the Chinese are nothing but lies, and there is no truth in what they write, so how could one possibly write a true history using such things as historical sources?
History is a discipline that, after events have ended, goes back from the results and clarifies causal relationships, and it is not something that can describe matters while they are still in progress.
Of course, I intend to continue watching modern China with interest, but I would be grateful if you would understand that a sequel to The True History of China cannot be written until after the Chinese Communist Party has reached its end.

Junko Miyawaki